In a rather frank interview with UK paper The Guardian, 80s revivalist Ladyhawke aka Pip Brown has claimed she suffers from Asperger Sydnrome. Amongst a phalanx of other health issues.

""I have this thing called Asperger's syndrome," she says. - a disorderon the autism spectrum characterised by difficulties with socialinteraction and idiosyncratic behaviour. "When I found out, itexplained my whole childhood. I told my mum and she said, 'That's whyyou used to sit on the floor doing puzzles for hours!' It was thereason I was so solitary. I'd say completely inappropriate things. Theother kids thought I was a weirdo.

"She mentions two traits associated with Asperger's: a thirst forknowledge and a love of music. At home, she would sit with her earglued to the radio, or listen to her parents' Beatles and Pretendersalbums. That's when she wasn't being sick: she suffered from a panoplyof illnesses and allergies that kept her in and out of hospital. Then,at the age of 10, she developed "this weird random disease that no onehad seen in New Zealand for 20 years. It's common in seagulls, but israrely transmitted to humans. Somewhere in New Zealand there's a photoof my face in a medical journal. It crept up to my brain. They caughtit hours before I was about to slip into a coma." She laughs. "So theyput me on penicillin and I had an allergic reaction to that! I nearlydied."

Ladyhawke, Craig Nicholls...Gary Numan. Aspergers is the new 'troubled childhood'. Seriously, it's healthy to bear in mind that the effects of Asperger Syndrome sufferers range from extremely mild to severe conditions; the latter often unable to reasonably communicate, understand empathy, respond to emotion, supress tics, develop motor skills and understand or perform simple cognitive tasks. Lest we forget that for severe sufferers, a life approaching the day to day normality of Joe public...or that of an internationally touring and recording rock star is, unlikely.

In other Ladyhawke news, her US tour scheduled to start next week has been cancelled due to Visa issues. In a MySpace post earlier this week she wrote:

I’m really devastated about this!!
My working visa couldn’t be processed in time so the shows had to be canceled!
We applied 2 months ago and are still waiting for them!!
I had everything booked, so as you can imagine I was really gutted!!
Its so strict trying to get visas for America!!
When they are finally processed I’ll definitely be coming over for shows!!!
I’m so sorry, to anyone who was going to come.

Stupid red tape.

lots of love
Ladyhawke
x x x
:-D

(Update: The post has now been removed. ?) Bummer. With the news that fashion house Chanel used Ladyhawke's 'Paris is Burning' on the runway last week, The Guardian reporting that Courtney Love and Kylie are fledgling fans and US blogs starting to cover her, it shouldn't be too long before she joins the Modular invasion stateside.


Ladyhawke - 'Dusk Till Dawn' (Fans and Friends Version)